The Memory of Absence
by Llassah
Summary: I hate you. That is what I should say, what I should think, feel. I shouldn't say that I miss you. I do. Remus never intended the letters he wrote to Sirius to be read. But after the war, all the things that were left unsaid between them must be resolved.


Sonnet 02, Edna St Vincent Millay.

_Time does not bring relief; you all have lied  
Who told me time would ease me of my pain!  
I miss him in the weeping of the rain;  
I want him at the shrinking of the tide;  
The old snows melt from every mountain-side,  
And last year's leaves are smoke in every lane;  
But last year's bitter loving must remain  
Heaped on my heart, and my old thoughts abide _

There are a hundred places where I fear  
To go,—so with his memory they brim  
And entering with relief some quiet place  
Where never fell his foot or shone his face  
I say, "There is no memory of him here!"  
And so stand stricken, so remembering him!

The man kneels on the stones in front of the archway. The man, Remus Lupin, finds it strangely appropriate that the veil- the Ministry's most shameful secret-is the only thing that remains. It is funny that the method of execution that caused so much controversy that three Ministry employees resigned is all that remains of it. No great monuments to the Ministry's greatness. Just a heap of stones, and a fluttering curtain. Voldemort is dead, all of the evil he spread is under this rubble, and the one thing that has not been obliterated is the thing he wants to be gone. Another one of fate's little jokes, a final twist in the corridor. He holds a bundle in his hands, tied up with a grey ribbon that is almost worn through in places, from having been idly, nervously stroked by a scarred thumb. Letters, written when their world collapsed for the first time. Angry letters, tear-stained, incoherent. He undoes the knot, forces himself to draw the first letter out, like sticking his hand in the fire, braced for the pain, for the memories. He has to read them. Has to. The letters are in order, organised with a cold, clean efficiency. He can do that. He can make things neat, put things in date order, archive, read, analyse. He has been doing it for so long now. He opens the first letter, the earliest, and braces himself for the immersion in memory.

_I hate you. That is what I should say, what I should think, feel. I shouldn't say that I miss you. I do. I cannot lie to you, though you lied to me. I try to tell myself that it is because I do not wish to sink to your level. That is a lie too. I do not lie to you, because I still miss you. If I lied to you, I would no longer be without blame. What could I have done? Why do I feel as though I were the traitor, not you? I will speak truth. I am going to harden my heart against you, make myself hate you, until all I have is resolve, and all I feel is hatred. I will make my heart a fortress, and forget you. And a part of me will forever be with you, and the Dementors will suck it out, as surely as they will take your soul. Give me time, love, and I will fully feel as if you betrayed me. I will betray you, and the guilt in my heart will have reason._

Remus does not want to let this letter go. He wants his only words to his love to be tender. He does not want his usually neat script to be shaky; he does not want the ink to have run with tears. He puts the letter down, takes the next one out and reads.

_I hate you. I hate the way you would know how empty these words feel if you were here. Hate should not be empty. It should pulse, bright and hot, giving me strength, determination, a reason to live, even if the reason is to hate you. I hate you not being here, when the world is so confusing. The colours are too bright for me here. They hurt my eyes, and the smells are too much, a sensory fever-dream. You would make me calm if you were here. You would hold my hand. It does not get easier. You would know this, too, if you were by my side. You knew about isolation, madness. If you hadn't known- I am still yours. I cannot escape. You caged me, took my heart. Did you give me yours? I hope not. I would not know what to do with it._

Sirius had. Even after the escape, when he had forgotten so much, had so much taken from him, he had remembered what they were. Remus wonders, sometimes, if they still have each other's hearts. He doesn't have his own any more. Perhaps he doesn't have his lover's either. Perhaps both their hearts had fallen, through the fluttering curtain, through the archway, through…

Through nothing. Nothing.

_This time, there was a storm. I remembered how you would stand outside and laugh at the lightning, playing games with it, making pictures, great crashing paintings of sound and light with your wand. You were never afraid, never beaten by the lightning. I sometimes thought you were secretly afraid of the storms, that this was defiance, a whistling in the dark. Perhaps you wanted the lightning to take you. The thought used to make me shiver. I shut the door, soundproofed the windows and sat in the darkness, trying to forget you. But the memories are strongest in the dark. Does my memory hurt you? _

When he escaped, he was afraid of the storms. They had battered Azkaban day and night. The next letter is brief, just a few sentences, written on the corner of a napkin.

_I crossed the world trying to escape you. I failed. Your absence made me think of you more than your presence ever did._

Proper parchment this time, in a neater hand. Six years had passed by this time. He had been so surprised at the rawness that was still there. This grief had not faded with time. It had just been covered up.

_Greyback visited me. Another promise gone. You broke so many promises. You promised that he would never touch me, that I would never be alone, that I would always be happy and safe, that you would protect me, that I would always be proud of who I was, because you were. Where are you now, love? Where were you all those times I broke the promises to you? I have broken the ones I made and more besides. I have allowed those 'Ministry bastards' to bring me down with their petty little rules and their fucking regulations. I have been in trouble, starving, lost, and I haven't run to you. I've had sleepless nights, drunk myself into a stupor, cried until my throat ached-_

_You were not there. You were never fucking there. I refused Greyback. I bit him, refused him and hit him over the head with my grandmother's silver teapot. My hand has burns all over it, my ribs are broken, I have a black eye and I had to move flats. But the worst thing about this whole business is that I only fought because I knew you would want me to, that you would worry otherwise. That was the only reason. You are the only reason for anything I do. I cannot write that I hate you. To write that I love you would betray James. I miss you, and I wish you were here. You win again._

It had taken six years to be able to tell him that. It was only then that he had felt able to visit the graves at Godric's Hollow. He had cried all the way back on the train. Then he had lit a candle in his bedroom window, the way he used to do when Sirius and James went out marauding and he was too ill to go with them. It had started as a way of telling them Filch was still patrolling for them. A lit candle had begun as an all-clear signal. Later, it was a light to guide his lover home.

_I saw Snape yesterday. He hates me. Seeing that loathing in his eyes, the sneer of his mouth- I could have kissed him. Do you realise how the old crowd treat me? Like some wounded dog, wheezing through life, a veteran of one too many fights. Molly keeps trying to feed me, tells me how thin I am, as if that would explain the tears in her eyes and the way she pats my hands. I do not stay there long. None of the children have seen me. Children ask too many questions, they have not learnt to lie yet, and their innocent curiosity would make me remember what should be forgotten. Snape does not lie either. He is too trapped in the past to lie. We are relics, both of us; he treats me as if the rest of you were around the corner, waiting to prank him, or insult him. It is as if nothing has changed. He does not pity me. When he pities me, I do not know what I will do. _

Snape had looked at him with pity when Tonks died. It was a jolt to know that a man who had lost so much thought he had lost more. Absurd. He had wanted to tell Snape to screw his pity, his useless meaningful glances. He hadn't. He knew, then, why his love had laughed when he had been captured. It had been the only thing left to do.

_Do you remember when we danced in the Room of Requirement? You stepped on my feet, and wouldn't let me lead. We got better though. I used to think we spent all of our time dancing, one way or another. When our hands would touch, going for the some piece of paper, when you would heap food on my plate when I wasn't looking to 'help me to fatten up', under a full moon, when the forest was silver and I wouldn't howl out my loneliness to the night, because you were there. Those steps we did around each other had such symmetry and beauty that it took my breath away. I have forgotten the dance now. I am heavy-footed, I stumble, trip, fall._

They had danced at James's wedding. It had started out as mischief, to scandalise McGonagall. It had ended as something much more, a distillation of all that they were, and all that they thought they would be. Both of them had cried, and wondered why when they were so happy. He cries now for the man he was before everything fell apart. He cries for a time he thought he knew every step.

_I cannot remember your face anymore. I know what went into it, I know I loved it once, but there is no picture of you in my mind. I could find a photograph, or a newspaper clipping, and you would be there, but I choose not to. I am not brave like you were. I do not grab trouble or memories. You were my courage, my spirit, my will. I want to run, and never stop. You told me that, when you left your family behind. You wanted to put so much distance between them and you, to pound your feet into the dust, pound the memory of them into the soles of your shoes, then kick your shoes off and run again. It reminded me of the times I am a wolf, and can do that, can stop being human, can run until my pads are blistered and worn. I transformed in the Forbidden Forest in the last full moon. I ran and ran, ran until morning. When I woke up, I was under the tree we used to sit by, next to the lake. My feet carried me to you. I love you. I hate you. And gods, I miss you._

Admitting that had been the bravest thing he had ever done. He was too despairing, too guilty to find pride in it then, but now, now that he has had more wounds, different grief, it is one of his only comforts. He loved him even when he thought he was a murderer and a traitor. He could love him through anything else. He had loved him through everything else. The week after that, Dumbledore had offered him a job at Hogwarts, and his lover had escaped. He had accepted. Seeing Harry, seeing what the man he loved had done, seeing what they could have both had was a form of penance for him. It had turned into a joy.

_He is like you. It shocks me that you are so similar, but you are both so defensive, rash, quick to anger, passionate, graceful, intelligent. He should be like James. He wears his face, looks out through Lily's eyes, but has your laugh, your mind, your tongue. I should not be so glad that you are alike, love. I should not be a lot of things. But I am._

He does not know why the next letter is in the pile. It reminds him of a different time, a time before Sirius. The handwriting is round, careful, childish, and the words are wistfully innocent. He did not know enough to be bitter when he wrote this. Only ten years old. He smiles slightly. So young.

_Dear Professor Dumbledore,_

_Thank you for your kind letter. I am very sorry, but I cannot go to your school. You may not know this, but I am a werewolf, and do not want to put the other children in danger. My father has said that he will educate me at home, and I might be able to get my O.W.L.s, if I work hard. Your school sounds like a very nice place, and I am sure that if I was not a werewolf, I would be very happy there. I am sorry if I have caused you any trouble,_

_Remus John Lupin_

The letter had been returned to him, not by owl, but by Dumbledore in person. It had taken a lot of persuasion to get him to hope, to believe that things were not going to go wrong. Since his fifth birthday, when he was bitten, Remus had been filled with a fatalistic certainty that however good things seemed, they could and would fall apart. He had been to school, though. He had taken the chance. Had he not— On bad days, he wishes that he had never aimed for something so out-of-reach. He wishes that he had stayed at home, safe with his father. That he had not been brave, and not been wounded. Then he feels a traitor to Sirius, as well as to his own kind.

After Sirius's death, Remus wrote one more letter. Just one. He had left so much unsaid between them, and ensured it remained so. It seemed…fitting, that sentences half-said were left that way. They are incomplete in so many ways, for so many reasons. Their dialogue had contained no heartfelt goodbyes, no grand leave-taking. Just a trip, a fall. A peculiar sort of end, really. He had written it after Tonks had died, when he would speak to no one, not even Harry.

_I would have kept her safe in my heart, held her and never let her go. But I gave my heart to you, and I do not know where you took it. I miss you. I hate you. I need you. I love you. I love you. I love. _

He picks up the bundle of letters, and flings them into the archway. He knows them by heart. He has no need for them any more; he has no need of their shape, of their sound, of the guilt, the hatred, the love. He has no one to share them with now. Remus stands up and dusts off his robes. "I don't know what to say. You took all my words of love with you. All I have is your name to whisper into the veil. Sirius."

Sirius. That word is an affirmation, holding everything Remus believes in, despite trying so hard not to. All of his hope, his dreams, his love. Sirius. Werewolves do not mate for life. Remus has. He turns around, picks up his battered briefcase, digs his other hand into his pocket, and leaves. The veil flutters. Perhaps this plan of Harry's will work. Perhaps Remus will see Sirius once again. He does not dare to hope. He almost hopes Sirius will not read these letters. He already knew everything that has been written on those scraps of parchment. He had already stolen Remus' heart; it was all written there, clear as black ink on a white page, just waiting to be read, memorised in absence.

Harry waits for him, sitting on a rubble pile on the other side of the battlefield. His face is smudged and dirty, he wears scruffy jeans and a faded black T-shirt; hardlythe clothes for a ritual. Sirius would have- will?- approve. He is blasting bricks to dust, a look of vindictive pleasure on his face. Remus can hear him mutter.

"And _that's_ for Umbridge, _that's_ for the gagging order of Lovegood, _that's_ for Shunpike, _that's_ for Buckbeak—"

He clears his throat. Harry looks up, and flushes guiltily, a sheepish smile flitting across his too thin face. "Are you ready?" he asks, green eyes glittering with excitement.

Ready? Ready to see his only link to the times he was happy fling himself into the veil with only a magical rope and his own strength of mind tying him to life?

_Sirius smiles, beckoning him. The water is cool, clear, lapping against his feet. Sirius is already in the water, damp hair sending rivulets of water down his shoulders to slide off his fingers and into the lake. "Ready?" he asks, grey eyes glittering with mischief, and a dark promise that makes Remus' breath catch in his throat. _

"Yes," he answers steadily.

They walk to the veil in silence. The rope is tied. Harry leaps. The rope tautens. Remus remembers. Remus hopes.

a/n- thanks to my shiny beta, valedro.


End file.
